All Rise...

The Charge

An epic as big as the land that shaped it.

The Case

I've read (and largely enjoyed) several James Michener novels through the
years, and Texas has the size and scope that's perfect for the Michener's
brand of meticulously researched historical fiction. I was all set to take the
small-screen adaptation Texas seriously—but then the DVD menu
loaded up and what should I see but an airbrushed photo of Patrick Duffy looking
like he belongs on the cover of a cheap paperback romance. Though it's
impossible to take Texas seriously after such a sight, it does reveal the
tension that keeps Texas from being great: though it wants to be an epic
story of the fight for Texas to be apart from Mexico, it's ultimately too slick
for its own good.

Narrated by Charlton Heston, Texas tells the story of the Texas
revolution that severed the future-state from Santa Ana-controlled Mexico, and
it largely focuses on the near-mythic men who were in charge of that revolution:
Stephen Austin (Patrick Duffy, Dallas),
Sam Houston (Stacy Keach, American History X),
Jim Bowie (David Keith, An Officer
and a Gentleman) and Davy Crockett (John Schneider, The Dukes of Hazzard).

I freely admit that I've read and enjoyed several Michener novels. However,
I can't really tell you which ones. I know I read Hawaii for summer
reading in high school, and there were several of his books lying around the
house as I grew up, but for the life of me I can't remember if Texas was
one of his novels that I read. Part of the problem is that my memory is hazy
over a decade later, but at least part of the blame rests on Michener's
shoulders. Though the specifics of each of his novels are very
different—informed as they are by reams and reams of historical
research—all the ones I encountered follow the same basic structure. He
spends a few pages on the geological forces that shaped the area in question,
then some time on what we know of the first inhabitants, and then the rest of
the book is dedicated to following a multigenerational story across the most
significant years in the area's history.

Texas wisely chooses to dispense with Michener's grand structure. The
film starts with Stephen Austin's attempts to create a settlement in Texas that
has special dispensation with the Mexican government, and follows him and the
other famous Texans through their growing dissatisfaction with Santa Ana towards
the eventual succession of Texas from Mexico.

For what it is, Texas isn't terrible. As a mid-nineties take on the
TV Western, it's standing in the long shadow of the vastly superior Lonesome Dove but as a pretty potted
version of Texas history that focuses on the great men behind the state's
independence it could be worse. The cast are all game to play these towering,
near-mythic figures, the (surprisingly high) budget allows for some nice shots
of the Texas landscape, and the story moves pretty smoothly over the three-hour
running time moving from significant event to significant event with some
interpersonal shenanigans thrown in to catch the melodrama audience.

This DVD does the show a service as well. The 1.33:1 transfer is "newly
enhanced" and looks pretty good, especially for a mid-nineties television
production. The dusty, often brown Texas landscape is well reproduced here, with
a decent amount of detail and good color saturation. The whole affair looks a
bit too slick and/or shiny to really sell the historical setting, but that means
this DVD transfer looks better than expected. Despite the three-hour runtime,
Texas doesn't have any significant compression problems or digital
artefacts. The stereo audio handles both the dialogue and the slightly bombastic
score with balanced ease.

Extras are surprisingly extensive for this kind of product, though hardly
groundbreaking. We get the show's trailer, an extended promo, and a short
making-of featurette. Since Texas was a $12 million made-for-TV flick in
1994 it had a lot of hype, and it's nice to see that material included on this
DVD.

The problem with Texas, though, is that it's redundant before it
starts. It tells the same old story of Texas' heroic fight for independence, and
while it's interesting at times to see the men behind the history, Texas
spends too much time with the bigger picture that we all know from the history
books instead of giving us insights into their characters. The overall look of
the film—personified by romance-cover Duffy—is also a bit too slick,
and distracts from the historical setting. I don't expect a major television
adaptation to go too dark, but a bit of dirtying-up would have helped the show
tremendously.

Texas is worth tracking down for fans of the actors or Michener's
novel, but if you're going to invest three or more hours in a story of the
settling of America then there are several other productions that deserve your
time more. With that said, Texas isn't without its
charms—especially the performances—and this DVD is solid enough to
make it worth a rental for the curious.